BEIJING – China’s internet administration announced on Sunday (July 4) that it had ordered smartphone app retailers to stop distributing Didi Global’s app after discovering that the ride-hailing company had illegally acquired users’ personal data. On its social media feed, the Chinese Cyberspace Administration (CAC) announced that it has forced Didi to make modifications in order to comply with Chinese data protection regulations. It didn’t say what Didi’s transgression was.
Didi responded by announcing that it would cease accepting new users and remove its app from app stores. It stated that it would make modifications in order to comply with the rules and defend the rights of users. In recent years, Chinese regulators have tightened data collecting laws for large digital companies. CAC initiated an inquiry against Didi on Friday, two days after the company began trading on the New York Stock Exchange, to defend “national security and the public interest.” Didi, which operates in China and over 15 other regions, collects massive amounts of real-time mobility data on a daily basis. It makes use of some of the information for autonomous driving and traffic analysis.
Will Cheng founded the company in 2012, and it has already faced regulatory scrutiny in China over its safety and operating license.
“We follow stringent protocols in collecting, sending, keeping, and using user data pursuant to our data security and privacy rules,” Didi wrote in its IPO prospectus, citing relevant Chinese regulations./n
